Superintendent Carlos Garcia of the San Francisco Unified School District speaks to members of the media on the district's improved score on the California Standard Test during a press conference at the SFUSD headquarter on Franklin St. in San Francisco, Calif. on Tuesday, Aug. 18, 2009.

Five San Francisco school district employees are under criminal investigation for allegedly receiving payments of up to $40,000 from community organizations they hired to do work for city schools, Superintendent Carlos Garcia said in a letter to all district employees and school board members Friday.

The five workers, including at least one senior staffer, all worked for the district's Student Support Services Department. The alleged payments apparently involved, at least in part, grants for after-school programs, according to district sources.

The names of the five individuals were not released.

District officials uncovered the irregularities over the summer and launched an internal investigation into the payments, Garcia said. Law enforcement officials were notified at the time.

The questionable one-time payments apparently ranged from a few thousand dollars to the $40,000.

"To the extent our investigation concludes any wrongdoing, we intend to pursue all legal remedies available to the district," Garcia said in the letter.

He noted that it's "against district policy for employees to receive payment for services they are already on salary with the district to deliver."

Four of the individuals are either on leave or have retired. Apparently one person was on unpaid administrative leave, but has returned.

"I do want to emphasize that the irregularities we are investigating relate only to a few people," he said. "There are many safeguards in place including (school board) reviews of all expenditures, a multistep process for any and all contracts and an annual third-party audit."

New safeguards were put in place this fall to ensure proper accounting of contracts with outside service providers, the superintendent said.

School board member Rachel Norton said the payments were difficult to detect, overseen by those entrusted with public funds.

"I'm confident this is something the board could not have known about," she said. "It's disheartening to think that one of our trusted employees could deceive the oversight practices we have in place."

Garcia asked those with information about irregularities to report any concerns to (415) 248-1321 or to e-mail reportfraud@sfusd.edu.